SMCISD Board of Trustees vote to end mask mandate

Kevin Baxter | Staff Reporter

On Monday, March 7, at 6 p.m. the San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District (SMCISD) held their board meeting where they discussed the mask mandate they implemented on Aug. 12, 2021.

Board member Miguel Arredondo commended that the school continue to recommend masks but leave the decision to the superintendent over whether the mask mandate should continue.

SMCISD Superintendent Michael Cardona spoke to the board in favor of changing the mask mandate due to the changing COVID-19 numbers in Hays County.

“So far in the in-house district, we’re average about five cases a week. That even includes asymptomatic testing on Friday, that’s five total a week. Students and staff and the asymptomatic,” Cardona said. “At one point we were getting hammered. Probably three weeks in a row, we averaged over 100 asymptomatic positives on that Friday and then just a complete drop off.”

Cardona explained that the seven-day running average for the county is 33 positive cases a day.

“If you remember last weekend when the CDC came out with their new guidance. There was also that little clause in there that it was dependent on your county,” said Cardona. “When you plugged in Texas and Hays County we were at a high then. So there was a misperception that we weren’t following CDC guidelines, but we were. As of today, we’re sitting at about a low. If you read, they have low, medium, and high and it tells you exactly what to do for each. The low falls into the range of self-monitoring symptoms and that’s really about it on the low level.”

Cardona ended his statement by affirming that Hays County was out of the high range and sitting closer to the low. Also that that drop-off is pretty consistent with what has been seen in the school district over the last three weeks.

Board member Anne Halsey moved for the board to authorize the superintendent to determine, for the remainder of the year, any  COVID-19 mitigation procedures the district needs to follow without any further board action.

All members of the board voted for Halsey’s motion, passing the motion to authorize the superintendent to determine if they should keep the COVID mitigation procedures.

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